Good afternoon, please see an open letter from Laredo Mayor Pete Saenz:
I write this open letter to the community out of concern about the City’s fiscal health. As Mayor, your elected representative to this public office, as public servant #1, I think we, elected officials, all have a responsibility to do what’s best for our city, our community.
I take pause and am concerned when I read headlines like the one that recently appeared in the paper. The question raised by the Laredo Morning Times on their Sunday, July 29, 2018 edition, questioning as to why city management did not publicly advise council of management’s recommendation on the four-year $15M collective bargaining agreement item, being that it was “council’s most singularly expensive general fund hits this year.” I assure you that we clearly heard from management in executive session. However, in open session, after some debate the majority of council decided to forego further contract negotiations and fu
rther management presentations; and approved the item in its entirety.
In as much as we all care and value our firefighters and their families, my concern is with the impact to our overall budget, and whether the City can continue to spend at the level it is now. I foresee in the near future major adjustments and impact to City services and staffing levels. Therefore, I am appealing to each of you. In the next few weeks, during the budget process hearings, and the final approval of the contract with the Firefighters and our proposed $661M government budget, city management will indeed present, publicly, the significant financial impact of such action. I ask myself, what about all of our other unions? Or the next group that comes to ask for similar salary increases?
I ask that you, my community of good hardworking people, please pay close attention to such disclosures in light of our high poverty rates, the overall economic uncertainty of our current state of affairs, and so many other operational pressing needs of our community.
I would like to invite the public, more stakeholders, to come in and join us, express your views, get engaged. The City Council budget workshops will be posted for August 13-15, 2018 at City Hall. They will start at 5:30 p.m. and proceed each night for three nights, and all are open to the public.
We all need to hear more from you, the citizens. We work for you, the tax payer, the families, the hard working people of our city. I commend our watchdog groups, we hear a lot from you, but I think we can never have too many comments, or people expressing their wants, needs and questions. You are now being called to evaluate and possibly save the fiscal life of our city; please, make your voices heard.
Sincerely,
Mayor Pete Saenz
